Monday, October 31

If you can recall how I felt while attending the last college course of Programming Using Visual Basic 2005, you know I did not enjoy it. I don't feel I really learned much from that class, other than it's looking like programming is not a career I want to specialize in. I don't know what the reasons were, but for some reason I just did not feel able to remember to coding rules of Visual Basic. Yeah, I'm told I will probably need to know at least some basic programming, which I do, very, very basic :-) In the end I recieved a grade of a C+, desipite failing the final exam miserably (per the grade and how I felt after taking the test). That is over though.

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Currently I am enrolled in the next class towards my degree. It's called Typography for the Web. It's basic how to use the program InDesign CS4 to create any type of written materials (books, magazines, etc) to convey meaning in type. I'm enjoying this class a lot more. Granted I've just began the 2nd week, but still. I'm grokking it much better as I'm a visual learner, hence why I'm majoring in Web Design (technologies), which looks odd when I see it written. I like how things look more than needing to know how they work (in general anyway). So far I'm getting an A. Yay!

Saturday, October 29

Her cake was a 2-layer, round meat cake, which I can't find pictures of. It looked like the usual kind of cake, but instead of sugar-frosting, it was covered with mashed sweet potatoes spread like frosting.

Sunday, October 23

With the last assignment today (before midnight Monday), I sent the below question to my teacher last night. His "answer" is in red. Needless to say, I won't get a good grade, if any, for the assignment I turned in. As for the final exam, I don't want to talk about it. Seriously.
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Question I asked about the course's last assignment.

I'm at a loss. I know nothing about office accounting. I'm trying to research what kinds of expenses a company's offices would have. I've never worked in a an office. They would need printer ink, paper, pens, pencils, and stuff like that, right? Basically I don't know where to begin, but I also don't want a "0%" for the assignment, so can you help get me started somehow? Video, webpage links?

Teacher’s answer:

You have summarized some expenses. that is fine. The goal is not that you have a magic list but that you can accomplish the project requirements. Please proceed.

Keep in mind, I've never, ever worked in an office, therefore I have no experience to draw ideas from. Unless someone can give me a very quick explanation on how to create this application/form in Visual Basic 2005, I'm going to get an "F" on this assignment. Just sayin!

Wagner Cable Company would like for you to write an accounting application that must report the day of the week when a bill must be paid. If a bill would be due on a Saturday or Sunday, it should consider that bill due on the previous Friday. What code will you use to meet the requirements? The data about the due date of the bill will be read from a database you will create.

They would also like for you to write an application in Visual Basic that will display the number of expenses for each office. The expenses should be broken down by category. They want to provide users with a visual display, using both bar graphs and pie charts. They also want users to be about to print the output. The data about the expenses will be read from a database you create. Make sure you have multiple offices and multiple expenses as data in the tables.

•How will you color-code each category in the bar chart?

•What method will you use to draw the bars?

•How will you color-code each category in the pie chart?

•What method will you use to draw the pie chart?

•What method will you use to label the charts?

•What object controls the color of the labels?

•How will you allow users to print the graphs?

•How will you allow users to select a printer?

•What can you do to optimize code reuse?

Submission Requirements:

Write the code to create the applications and submit a zip file of the project folder created by Visual Basic.

It's the day before the end of my hardest class to date. All I'm going to do between now and taking the final exam tomorrow is just whatever I want to. Serious-er though, it's all good. I've stopped obsessing about being an expert at programming with Visual Basic after only 6 weeks. See what school does to some people? It stresses them out. That being said, I've stopped stressing about it, for the most part. I mean, you know, I want to get good grades in all of the classes. I just have to remember that just because I'm not an expert at one thing doesn't mean anything. I don't have to be. I'm good at many other things.

Wednesday, October 12

Wish me luck everybody. My computer crashed last night w all my school programs, shortcuts, and everything. It's all gone. Was just able to connect to the internet around noon. Everything I do on it as far as new installs seems to be a pain in the ass. Only 5 hours to go and Windows Service Pack 3 will be downloaded. Hopefully I'll be able to get Windows updates once that's installed. PS I'm using Angelica's computer right now, in case you care. Finally signed into my class a little while ago. Seems the homework I turned in last night was not rite by the time the teacher got it, so he wants me to resend it. Unfortunately I don't have it anymore. I'm downloading a program I need on A's laptop rite now, but our connection sucks today, so it's going to be a while before I can do said homework. Hopefully the 50th hour (it seems) of writing the fucking VB programming will get me better than a 25% grade on attempt #2. Yes, that's what he gave me on the last assignment. That leaves my overall grade at 68% for the course with this and next week to go, and I'm 4 assignments behind, not counting this weeks. I may just fail this stupid class! Maybe I'm not cut-out for Web Design Technology college work :-(

Monday, October 3

In my case, VB 2010, but the text & workbooks for the class were both written for VB 2005 software. Now I don't know exactly what the differences are between the 2 versions, but I do know there are some. Included in those "somes" are different screen layouts, and little differences with some of the buttons on the toolbar on top. Some of the menu items are different too. I thought that there was (is) enough things in common that I could just read/do the stuff in the workbook and cross whatever I learned about VB 2005 when I started actually using the 2010 version to do programming. Now I'm not so sure. It may just be me though. Not making a huge deal out of it, but I'm starting to think that the main reason I just do not seem to be getting this Visual Basic stuff is because of the ongoing effects of my last MS exacerbation of dizziness and nausea (and possible MS brain fog). Rain agrees that those things may indeed be causing me to struggle a bit to grasp the programming language. As much as I just want(ed) to "power through" it, I'm not doing so well in that regard. Although I'm currently carrying a 96%(4.0) grade point average, I don't feel it's a true 'A' grade. Know what I mean? I have sent an email to my college teacher and updated him on what's happening with my MS. He said he is familiar with MS symptoms, which is great to know. He asked me if I thought the symptoms would 'stabilize' within the next 3 weeks of class and I told him I didn't know. Don't really expect much in that regard as it's only been 3 weeks and exacerbations typically last 6 weeks or so for me. I also asked what he suggests I do in this situation. I haven't heard back yet, but I did just send that email a couple of hours ago. I also sent him an email explaining that because I'm not only having to learn the programminglanguage itself, but I'm having to also learn the Visual Basic program too, so that may be a reason for getting a little behind with my homework. He hasn't wrote back with anything about that either.-I really did mow for the last time this season. Even doing that was a bit of a struggle though. Even making big circles around the place, I had to keep a tight grip on the steering wheel so I didn't get dizzy and fall off. LOL.-Now I'm in the process if uninstalling some of the programs for school that I don't need at the moment, to increase the processing speed of the VB program as well as the computer overall. We shall see.